Superconducting race arbiter with subpicosecond timing discrimination

A novel race arbiter for ultrahigh resolution time discrimination is proposed and has been designed, fabricated, and tested in an all-niobium Josephson junction technology. The arbiter is based on a pair of quantum flux parametrons, which are single flux quantum switching devices, and is hence called a BiQFP for Bi-quantum Flux Parametron. High-speed experiments have demonstrated a rms single-shot time jitter of ±200–300 fs.